Ghostbusters Doom Patrol: Air
by CJ Bacon
Summary: This is a standalone story taking place mere hours after the events of Part 2 of Bohemian Rhapsody. If you don't understand what's going on here, read that story.


Ghostbusters Doom Patrol

"Air"

Andrew had not returned back to the headquarters. Sitting alone on a bench near Fairmount Park (just east of Philadelphia's predominately middle-class black neighborhood of Wynnefield), he stared out across the lonely ballpark that the bench overlooked. Summer was quickly ending, and it would see a lot more of this bleakness.

"Damn", he said putting his head down. He hated the season of Fall. For some reason, everything about it just amounted to "dick" with him. It wasn't that he outright hated it, but he had no love for the season either. He believed that poets such as Emerson and Thoroeau were out of their minds when they found the so called "beauty" in the changing of the seasons. The leaves change colors, the fall, and they die. It was all part of a natural cycle, one that everyone goes through, and, somehow, Andrew could not see the true beauty behind it.

That evenings events hadn't done much for his dispostion either. Being caught off-guard as he was the living dead was something that hadn't happened in _years._

_Not since Cyrus took me in_, he thought. Sitting quietly at his right boot was a rock about the size of a walnut. Picking it up, he immediately tossed it into the fading darkness of the baseball field, hearing it rustle between the bushes as it landed in a woody area. There weren't a whole lot of others around him at that moment: he had taken notice, once he arrived in the area, of a couple of teens there hoping to make the night their "magic moment". A night watchmen eyed Andrew suspiciously. Deep down, Andrew wished that the watchmen would try to hassle him. The way he felt now, jail would seem like a paradise. However, once he approached the bench he was currently occupying, he felt strangely content by the loneliness around him.

Alone.

The word almost hung around him like his fanged necklace. He hadn't spoken to his parents in years, not since the night when his whole meaning, his whole _purpose_ in life changed; the one person he had allowed to be something close to a confidant was the late Cyrus MacTaggert, a man (one of the very few) that Andrew outright admired; despite being a member of the Ghostbusters Doom Patrol for three years now, he could not help but feel that he still did not fit in with the "group". He was the outcast; he had actually killed; he knew death, he breathed death. Death sat next to him every time he took a rest. In short, Andrew lived the life of someone whose sole meaning was to look in on others but not reaping that happiness. He would grow old alone and continue fighting alone.

_Then I will die alone_.

"You ever play little league before?"

The voice startled Andrew, but he tried not to show it. Glancing to his left, he saw Salina. She was standing next to the bench, looking at him, her hands inside her coat pocket. Her uniform was still splattered with the blood of the dead soldiers.

Remaining indifferent, Andrew snorted and said, "You really should've changed out of that."

"Didn't have time", Salina replied taking a seat next to Andrew. "But you didn't answer my question."

"What was it?"

"Did you ever play little league?"

Andrew looked at her with his cold eyes. Sighing, he said:

"I never got into it. Seemed kind of stupid to be all organized just to have someone yell and bitch at you for dropping a pop fly."

"So what were you looking at?"

"Nothing." Which was the truth.

"Okay", Salina said, leaning back against the bench. Andrew noticed for the first time that he raven-colored hair was down this time, covering her shoulders and back. "Crazy night tonight, wasn't it?"

"Is this what you call small talk?" Andrew asked.

"Not really", Sailina replied. "I call it making conversation seeing as we got nothing else to do here."

She had a point, Andrew realized. "I blame myself for what happened tonight", he said finally, keeping his face away from Salina's gaze She stared at him, shocked a little by this forthright confession. "If I had had my mind in the right place...if I had bothered to bring in my Hastings...if I had thought to be better prepared for battle..."

"It still wouldn't have made any difference in the world Andrew", Salina said. She was not alert, hunched over a little bit but still facing Andrew. "You do know that that's a fault we all have..."

"Heh", Andrew said, risking a smirk. "I don't believe in faults."

"No?"

"No. That whole mantra crap is just complete bullshit. We humans have the ability to choose how we dictate our lives. Any inherent 'faults' we might make is due to our own shortcomings not to prevent them."

"Sounds like a true Buddhist monk", Salina deadpanned.

"Feh, how would you understand anyway?"

"How could I", Salina said standing up now, "When you don't let anybody into your world?"

Andrew finally raised his head and was now looking at her face to face. He took notice that Salina's expression was not the same one he had seen earlier that evening. It wasn't the officious little girl he had so gleefully tormented like some 4th grade student. It wasn't even the soft, caring look of the teammate with whom he felt probably the closest to.

He was looking into the eyes of a woman.

"You go around believing that you've actually got nothing and nobody to care about", she said sitting back down, her voice losing its hairy edge. "You don't even try to understand the world around you..."

"You don't understand the world", Andrew said. "The way the world is going...it's all wrong. Completely. Fucking. _Wrong_."

"But that doesn't mean it has to stay that way."

"Yeah right."

"You see a world that has completely fucked itself over too many times and believe it's beyond saving. You only see the Darkness."

_The Darkness_. That was an assumption that even Andrew had not thought of before.

Salina continued. "There's more to life than just the Darkness. Why do you think you risk your entire being to eradicate the undead?"

"To make sure what happens to me doesn't happen to anyone else."

"Or because deep down in that black hole you call a heart you still genuinely believe in humanity. We're a pretty strong-willed bunch of scrappers you know. If we wanted to make ourselves, what are the odds that by tomorrow we _could _do it?"

"Very slim", Andrew said. "Since you believe me to a Prince of Darkness, how do you see everything?"

Salina now looked over towards the ballpark, over at the rising sun. Andrew noticed that she was looking at a gigantic oak tree standing a little beyond the ballfield, it's many long branches appearing as though it were taking a much needed stretch. "I see everything eventually working itself out", she said. "I have faith in humanity for understanding what needs to be done."

"And you can glean all this from just looking at a tree?" Andrew scoffed.

"Not just the tree, Andrew. Everything around it. Don't you see?"

Glancing back, Andrew squinted, trying to zero in on what it was Salina was talking about.

"It's not that hard Hawkeye", she said.

"What is it then?"

"The ballfield, the tree. It is all a statement to a much deserved fact."

"Which is?"

"That humanity has more fortitude than their own kind give them credit for. Once everything--the stars, the sun, the moon--have all extinguished and the Universe is put into a real Darkness, there has to be something, a monument, that represents the beings on this planet meant more than just foodbags. It has to be what makes a kid think he can be the next Reggie Jackson? Or even outdo Clyde Pennington? All this has to be here for us to appreciate where we came from and where we are going."

Andrew stayed silent for a moment. "Not just the ballpark, but everything that reminds us of why we try", he mused. "We all try in this life before we exit it. If we don't do anything, it's really all left bare. Like that tree."

Salina laughed. "Exactly. Now you're understanding. We all have to die, someday, but we can things that will serve as introductions to a new generation before we go." Suddenly, Salina stood up, grinning from ear. Grabbing Andrew's hand, she said "Come on!" Confused, Andrew reluctantly followed, until he found himself approaching a leaf pile at the base of the oak tree. Flurries of red, gold, and orage dotted across the little.

"Salina, why are we--"

Salina playfully gathered a handful of leaves and threw them in Andrew's hair, gleefully laughing at the sight. The look of indignation on Andrew's face made her laugh harder.

Andrew smirked slightly, and, cooly brushing the leaves from his hair, gathered his own and tossed over in Salina's direction. Salina tried to run, but Andrew was quicker, shoving a pile onto her head. Both were laughing as they chased each other around, the leaves swirling around them as they threw them at each other. Finally, Salina laid down, out of breath, upon the grass staring up at the sky. Andrew was sitting against the oak.

"I haven't had fun like that since I was eight years old", Salina said, rolling around a little in the grass.

"Yeah", Andrew said. "Life is good at that age."

"Ah-ha!" Salina said getting up and pointing a finger at Andrew. "You do remember what it meant to be a child!"

This time, Andrew could not help but smile. "I used to mess around in the yard when my dad raked the leaves up. He'd make the biggest piles you'd ever seen, bigger than probably me. And I would come around and just dive right into it, _ka-BLAM!_"

Salina Duran regarded Andrew for this moment. He finally looked and acted as though he truly were a part of the human again.

"Well, I guess the guys are wondering were we went off too", she said dusting her backside off. As she extended her hand to help Andrew up, he pulled her down towards him, catching her with his left hand.

"Andrew, what are you doing?"

He stared deeply into her eyes, noticing how, for the second time that night, brilliant they looked. He could not understand the feeling he got when he was around her, but he didn't give a damn either. He got closer to Salina, his heart traversing all around his chest. Salina herself felt an almost

(((is it supernatural?)))

pull towards Andrew. She removed his glasses from his face, seeing his eyes. _He's got a wonderful color_, she thought.

It did not matter much if the park security was going to accost them later for disrupting the foliage.

It did not matter if anyone else saw them.

What did matter, for both of them, was that they had found the meaning of what it is to be truly human. There is no need to be alone, because love is really all you need in this life.

_From this moment on I know_

_Exactly where my life will go._

_Seems that all I really was doin'_

_Was waiting for you._

--John Lennon


End file.
